Archive of

The AFC Staff

Art F City is pleased to announce the launch of their new programming arm, PARADE, which supports and commissions civically engaged public art in Western Queens and beyond. Founded with a mission of fostering dialogue and connection through art, PARADE is co-directed by Paddy Johnson, writer, organizer and Art F City founder, and Nancy Kleaver, a nonprofit management arts education consultant, and community advocate.

Which 30-year-old DC art space got its start by petitioning Mayor Walter Washington to take over a room filled with broken parking meters

Which nonprofit gallery dedicated to women in the arts opened its doors in a former doctor’s office located inside a leaky English basement apartment?

To find out, join us for the release of We Are SO Not Getting the Security Deposit Back; a Guide to Defunct Artist-Run Spaces (DC Edition). This zine is is the first of a series conceived by the NYC-based art blog Art F City, and co-published by the DC-based artist initiative Beltway Public Works with curator Blair Murphy. It documents spaces from the 1970s to the near present, and includes long-running entities like Market 5 Gallery and the Washington Women’s Art Center, and short-term projects such as FLEX, which ran for two days in an unrented ground-floor retail space. Publishing these stories makes visible the role of artist-run spaces in the cultural fabric of the city. As Paddy Johnson writes, projects like these, “made with love and tears” are “the ones least likely to be archived — and most precious to us.”

We’re taking a short break for the month of August so we can plan for the new season. We’ve got a lot up our sleeves and we can’t wait to tell you about it. Look for us in September for some big announcements. See you then!

Let the bidding begin! The Art F City 12th anniversary paddle8 auction is live, which means you’ve got exactly two weeks to secure that work you love. Our auction closes April 28th, so be sure to watch it carefully!

Gothic coupling (the ultimate date night for those who come in costume):$250

Additional donation levels and perks available. Tickets at the door cost $100 for artists and $200 for individuals.

Good news readers! If you’re one of the next 50 people to buy a ticket to the Art F City Goth Benefit, you get a limited edition t-shirt out of the deal. This isn’t any ordinary t-shirt. We worked with designer Phillip Niemeyer to produce this design, which pairs the famous logo of the Bauhaus School of Design—later, appropriated and popularized by the goth band, Bauhaus, with the Art F City Goth Opera logo. Perfectly balanced, this design represents the brave spareness within the best Modernist work, with the courage imbued within goth culture and the art world at large. But act fast. There are only 50 t-shirts and they won’t be available for long.

Gothic coupling (the ultimate date night for those who come in costume):$250

Additional donation levels and perks available. Tickets at the door cost $100 for artists and $200 for individuals.

Whether Bauhaus has been on your playlist since before iTunes existed or you’re a black-lipstick virgin, the April 18th Art F City Goth Benefit is an event for you. The more black you wear, the better your night.

We are a people in mourning. A dark shadow has been cast from Gotham’s blackest tower, stretching across the land. We lament at its doorstep.

We, the nation’s bloggers, journalists, artists, and critics were some of the first to cry. But our cries went unheeded. Now we must paint our lips in the darkest of hues and adorn our bodies with the garments of bereavement. It is time for our sadness to be made visible.

It is time for a Goth Opera.

In an era when independent journalism couldn’t be more critical, Art F City will throw its first goth opera to benefit this essential work, featuring the rich, versatile 3+ octave voice of Joseph Keckler. Like a black velvet hood, our event will instill an element of mystery opulence—all in support of independent journalism and the arts in 2017.

These are not good times. None of Donald Trump’s bat-shit crazy ideas should ever see the light of day, much less take the form of executive orders (EO). But here we are, 12 days into his presidency and the chaos is taking root. Trump’s EO on visa bans effects 7 countries, approximately 90,000 people directly and innumerable more indirectly. His tariff plan to pay for a needless wall between the US and Mexico will cost Americans billions. And it’s already costing Mexicans—the peso is at a record low due to increased worries of Trump-led trade war.

None of this is beneficial to the country or the world, so we need to respond. There are many ways to do this, but here at AFC we’ve settled on a fairly direct approach. For the next year, we’re allocating $4,000 of our commissions budget to supporting artists, writers and cultural workers effected by Trump’s policies. If we’re able to raise more money for the program, we’ll increase that number.

Art F City and the New York Studio Residency Program (NYSRP) present Taxes for Artists, a talk by accountant and artist Hannah Cole. Cole is a tax expert who specializes in working with creative businesses and artists. A long-time working artist with a high-level exhibition history, Hannah has a unique vantage point for understanding the financial challenges of freelancers and small creative businesses.